Like Normal People
by Lady Devonna
Summary: Kurt and Todd try out having a regular date. It's... interesting. A Valentine's Day special event! (Ties into my giant fic "Ripples," but you don't *need* to read that. Wish you would, though.) Kurt/Todd, slash, excessive cuteness, etc.


Todd frowned at the broken telephone he was screwing with. It was a lot harder to round up old mechanical junk when he had to go through all the fuss of leaving the mansion and heading to town instead of just popping out of the sewer near the junk store or a good dumpster. Problem was, he had nothing he wanted to do with this particular pile of bits, and the only thing you could really make with an old phone was a very slightly different old phone.

He was pulled from his reverie by a knock at the door. "Yeah?"

"Guten Abend, Liebling,"

"Get in here, furball," he said standing and turning toward the door with a grin. When Kurt ported in _behind_ him, he didn't even mind getting pounced on. He did have time to quickly hiss, "No biting!"

"Aw." Kurt's arms wrapped around his chest and he nuzzled into Todd's hair. "Fine..."

"Sup, fool?"

"Bothering you." He let go and sat on the bed, grinning up at Todd invitingly. He didn't hesitate to sit down and snuggle up. Todd wished he could keep up, but he never figured out what to initiate before Kurt thought of something first and better. This time, he took Todd's hand and pressed the solid palm to his cheek.

"Never, my sublime sapphire." At least he had lots of practice doing that. Todd leaned into him happily. This was still new and weird and he couldn't help thinking it was going to explode, but damned if he wasn't loving it while it lasted.

"So, uh, remember that stuff I said about how we should get cheap pizza and go to an action movie on Friday?"

"Which is today, unless I lost track," Todd said. "An' it's just as nuts as when yah said it last time." The list of people who would massacre two male mutants on a date included all their friends, enemies, and perfect strangers.

"But I want to."

"They will straight up murder us, Nightcreeper." And Todd didn't think it was that big a deal, anyway. He'd seen people on dates while he loitered at the mall. They seemed happy and all, but not any happier than he was snuggling up to soft blue fur in the basement of the Xavier Institute.

"Und also, uh, the professor just gave me my new image inducer."

Todd leaned back to make it clear how incredulously he was eying his boyfriend. "An' that means what?"

"Plus a spare, since bad things keep happening to them."

Now he got it. "Have I ever told yah yer bugfuck nuts?"

"No, come on, watch this." He put on the ugly watch and fiddled with it. Todd watched incredulously, knowing Kurt tended to screw it up whenever he touched anything other than the on/off switch. He also found he didn't like this face nearly as much now that he had permission to smooch the real one. He even leaned in and stole a kiss on the cheek to remind himself of the fuzz underneath the illusion. Kurt smiled at him, but went back to the watch. "Ah! There you are."

And instead of the Kurt who went to school every day, his long lost twin sister was sitting on the bed. The illusion even had makeup. "The professor did it as a joke."

"...You have no pride, man."

"Pride is for people who don't want to take you to a movie." Girl-Kurt poked him playfully. "Besides, I'm already making out with you, ja? I can't afford to be insecure about my masculinity."

Oh, whatever. He gave up. "Thing is, yah still look like _you_." Kurt's image inducer was based on his real face, and his sharp, delicate features edged on the feminine anyway. "That you, anyways. Here." He took Kurt's hand and fiddled with the watch. He began the task pragmatically, but after a moment he was quite unsure what to do. Would it be weirder if he tried to make Kurt his type of girl or not? Geeze.

But worrying wasn't fun. He settled on amusing himself, as the whole thing was really absurd. "There, done, go look in a mirror."

Kurt stood and walked to the mirror, then took a moment to stare. "Did you have to dress me like my sister?"

"I like the goth look. You should do it some time. The real you, I mean." Todd tried to sound casual, but he really did want to see that. Black and silver on deep blue... He shook himself out of the reverie and checked over his handiwork. The girl in the floor length skirt and blue corset top did resemble Kurt's usual form if you really looked at the face, which was harder to tweak, but he'd given her much darker skin and curly hair, so no one was going to think to look. "Still a bad idea, man. I'm kinda creeped out."

"Close your eyes," Kurt instructed. Or his voice did, coming out of the admittedly really hot girl. Weird. Todd did as he was told, and was very thoroughly kissed for his trouble. "I still feel like me, right?"

"Yeah. ...Weird, though. Okay, so I get the other one?" He still thought Kurt was being silly, but he cooperated. He was a bit lazy programming his own disguise, though.

"...You're clearly Legolas."

"Nah, not even."

"Nein, you didn't even try. You're Legolas with less hair and jeans on."

"Fine." He fiddled a bit more. "Now I'm goth Legolas."

"...And for some reason that's fine with me. Okay, ready to go?"

"They're takin' the hobbits to Isengard!"

"Come on." Kurt wrapped an arm around Todd's waist and they popped out in a generally quite abandoned bit of the park. "Ready?"

"What the hell." He took Kurt's hand and let himself be led toward downtown Bayville. "You better let me talk. Yah don't actually sound like a girl, saffron cream."

"...Saffron?"

"Ain't that blue?"

"Nein, it's kind of orangey."

"Oops. Well, y'know what I meant."

"Ja, I do." Kurt squeezed his hand and quieted for a moment. "Did you have to give me giant heels?"

"Covers up for the feet."

"Huh. Guess it does." He examined the effect for a moment and caught back up.

"Really. There's people now." It was only the beginning of spring, but despite the cold and wet, apparently the faint green around the edges of the world and the fact that winter had gone on too long had chased people out on into the world this particular Friday evening. And a lot of the people out were couples, the younger ones readily recognizable if you went to Bayville high.

Todd hesitated at the ornate gate that led into the park, knowing perfectly well they were disguised but having trouble breaching the boundary between a stupid joke and actually going through with it.

Kurt grabbed his arm and pulled him out into the street, kissing his cheek as he stumbled onto the sidewalk. He stood still for a moment, waiting for someone to know, somehow. That they were themselves, that they were mutants, both guys, that he was Todd Tolansky and nothing good was supposed to happen to him, ever.

Absolutely no one noticed them. When he did fall into step with Kurt, a dog being walked by a middle aged couple was mildly interested, but it didn't actually seem to object.

There was a certain thrill in walking down the street, holding hands in front of everyone. But in turn, their stupid disguises just reminded him that they weren't allowed to do this. He wasn't getting into it. But Kurt clearly was. Even without talking, which had to be an effort for the thing that wouldn't shut up, he was bouncy and affectionate and excited.

The cheap pizza Kurt had mentioned was a quiet, dimly lit place, so they could chance a little conversation at their corner table after Todd ordered. Even that had been depressing, seeing the difference in the way the bored girl at the counter treated the guy she saw and the way she and her ilk would treat the real him.

Though it did help a little that Kurt decided to play footsie under the table. Todd had never been clear on what was supposed to be so great about it, but at least the effort was nice.

The crowd was just a little thinner on the way to the theater. Enough that Todd could relax if not exactly enjoy himself. There was someone wonderful on his arm. He should be having a great time. This was, as Kurt had protested, what people did.

He thought they were in real trouble when Kurt stopped, but when he looked, the illusion held just fine. He had to follow the girl who wasn't Kurt's eyes to the problem, and he almost laughed. Wolverine was coming out of a store in front of them. "Chill, we look fine."

Todd hadn't accounted for sense of smell. Logan looked straight at them, shook his head slightly, and emphatically climbed onto his bike. "And now I got the heebie-jeebies for life. Thanks, Elf."

"Think you got it bad?" Todd said, before he thought better of it.

"...You huntin' orks, kid?"

"Legolas is cool. Shut up."

He snorted at them and pulled away on the bike. Todd sighed and started to turn back to Kurt, but before he was halfway there, he was yanked unceremoniously into an angle and pulled into another teleport, landing back in the park. He was pretty sure Kurt was angry, but severe girl's makeup made it hard to read even the parts of the face that were familiar.

"Sorry for making you so miserable." The girl in Kurt's place crossed her arms.

"Hell, I'm sorry. I tried. It just... This is too screwed up." Dammit. He'd known all along he was gonna screw up. Sooner rather than later, it turned out. Damn. Well, that had been a really good couple days. Todd dropped down into a deep crouch, looking away.

"Todd, you have to say these things. Gott im Himmel. I can't read your mind." Kurt knelt down beside him. "I mean, I wanted to go, but I wouldn't have made you."

He thought his reluctance had been pretty clear. "Look, I... I don't really mind, usually. That we gotta be all secret, even from the people we like. But this was just nothin' but the universe makin' it clear that we can't do this for real. I don't even care about normal dates. It's kinda boring, actually. Not that bein' with you is boring, but dinner an' movies... Meh."

"You like sitting in trees throwing rocks at stuff better?"

Todd finally looked over and reached for Kurt's wrist, switching off the image. Finally. There was his boy. "Yeah, but the big thing is I like us. I don't wanna do this stuff if we gotta be someone else to do it."

Kurt kissed him gently. "I understand."

"...Should I take mine off?"

"I didn't mind kissing Legolas all that much..." He ducked Todd's tongue with a giggle. "Ja, take it off. Und we'll go sit by that baseball field that floods until June." He packed away the extra image inducer with a sigh. "Someday we'll go see a stupid movie, though."

"If you say so, man."

"I do, and I'm the boss." Kurt ruffled his hair fondly. "...Would you mind waiting here one second? I'll be right back."

Todd nodded, confused, and hung out on the bench for about five minutes, watching the streetlights flicker outside the park. Kurt teleported back, immediately switching off the normal teenaged boy face again, and presented him with a red, foil-covered box shaped like a heart.

"...Really, now?"

"Just give me this, please? I'm a terrible romantic und I want to spoil you. You make it so hard to be nice to you." He pulled the pouty face that would have made an angry lion back off apologetically.

"Ain't it almost April? How long has this stuff been sittin' there?"

"I wiped the dust off. You don't have to eat the death chocolate. It's probably all coconut anyway." Kurt sat on the ground, heedless of the wet gravel, and rested his head against Todd's knee. "You might be happy making out in the basement und having sandwiches I steal from the kitchen, and I'm the first to admit that's fun, but I want, you know, special stuff to happen."

"X-dweeb." Todd stroked his hair gently. "Trust me, yah don't gotta work on it." Every time Kurt was near he felt special. Getting kissed was on a different plain entirely. Empty ritual from bad movies was so totally needless he wanted to laugh, but he was afraid he'd upset Kurt again. "C'mon, let's hit the baseball field. I need to kiss yah a lot."

"Yessir." Kurt sat up on his knees and wrapped his arms around Todd's waist. They landed in a heap next to the rickety bleachers. He was pretty sure the heap was intentional, and he wound up on his back in the beginnings of grass, head resting on Kurt's stomach while they listened to the spring peepers.

Good day after all.


End file.
